y call
the dominoes. It was the handiwork of the poor French creature, that had
no other Christian employment but making these and suchlike, out of
sheep-shanks and marrow bones. I never liked gambling all my life, it
being contrary to the Ten Commandments; and mind of putting on the back
of the fire the old pack of cards, with the Jack of Trumps among them,
that the deboshed journeymen tailors, in the shop with me in the
Grassmarket, used to play birkie with when the maister's back was turned.
This is the first time I have acknowledged the transaction to a living
soul; had they found me out at the time, my life would not have been
worth a pinch of snuff. But as to the dominoes, considering that the
Frenchy must have left them as a token of gratitude, and as the only
payment in his power for a bit comfortable supper, it behoved me--for so
I thought--not to turn the wrong side of my face altogether on his
present, as that would be unmannerly towards a poor stranger.

Nevertheless, and notwithstanding all these reasons, the dominoes, after
everything that can be said of good anent them, were a black sight, and
for months and months produced a scene of riot and idleness after working
hours, that went far to render our housie that was before a picture of
decorum and decency a tabernacle of confusion and a hell upon earth.
Whenever time for stopping work came about, down we regularly all sat,
night after night, the wife, Benjie, and Tommy Staytape, and myself,
playing for a ha'penny the game, and growing as anxious, fierce, and keen
about it, as if we had been earning the bread of life. After two or
three months' trial, I saw that it would never do, for all subordination
was fast coming to an end in our bit house, and, for lack of looking
after, a great number of small accounts for clouting elbows, piecing
waistcoats, and mending leggins, remained unpaid; a great number of wauf
customers crowding about us, by way of giving us their change, but with
no intention of ever paying a single fraction. The wife, that used to
keep everything bein and snug, behaving herself like the sober mother of
a family, began to funk on being taken through hands, and grew
obstrapulous with her tongue. Instead of following my directions--who
was his born maister in the cutting and shaping line--Tommy Staytape
pretended to set up a judgment of his own, and disfigured some
ploughmen's jackets in a manner most hideous to behold; while, to crown